Most of my visiting friends and relatives from Hong Kong did not like the Americanized Mexican food because they were quite greasy with large amount of cheese and sour cream.

Inevitably, every time someone new visiting from Hong Kong or Asia, I would bring them to Oaxaca to for some authentic Mexican food.

Oaxaca had changed the minds of many of my friends and relatives.

Many of them had asked for a repeat visit to Oaxaca when they visited again.

I would have to admit even though many dishes were exceptional at Oaxaca, I had got into the rut of only ordering one item on the menu — Caldo de Pescado, a very spicy fish soup with vegetables.

Generous chunk of tender fish (I believe they were catfish), with bones were cooked with carrots, melon-type vegetables.

My ears burnt every time I had this soup but it was so so good.

The soup came with their in-house tortilla which were soft, mildly corn flavored and tasty.

It remained as an item that DH, my sister and I refused to share with anyone.

We each had our own and totally satisfied afterwards.

Since I went with my parents, my father ordered another new version of the soup, but with beef meat balls.

The meat balls were tender, soft and flavorful, and it seemed like it had the same soup base.

Since there were 3 of us, we got to order their Mole as well.

We ordered it with pork and the sauce was just delectable.

The sauce was sweet, delicious with complex flavors of cinnamon, chocolate, peppers and fairly sure with many other herbs and spices.

I really just wanted the sauce with the fluffy rice and could just skip the meat.

In the past, we also had the halibut tacos which were fresh and tasty, tacos with carne asada, and empanadas, and they were all superb.

Guacamole and chips were always a hit with their many different kinds of salsa and hot sauces.

The restaurant was always busy at night and DH just did not like to wait for food.

I had taken the habit to go for lunch which was easy to get seats, and took to-go fish soup for DH.

Since we were in the neighborhood, we also went to B&O Espresso for dessert.

We used to go to the old location on Capitol Hill which unfortunately had to close after more than 25 years of business due to new development in the area.

I was glad that they were able to find another location; otherwise, the chocolate drinks and desserts would be thoroughly missed.

My father and 100% believed that they had the best eclair in town.

Elcair was my Dad’s favorite dessert.

We went around town 2 years ago trying different eclairs.

What we found was that most éclair had whipped cream inside as filling.

The ones at B & O had a custardy cream in it.

The custardy cream made the éclair less soggy in texture, and introduced another eggy flavor dimension to the dessert.

It also had just right sweetness even for Chinese sweetness scale.

Coupled with the fantastic chocolate ganache on top, it was to die for.

L: elcair — Top: espresso chocolate torte — Bottom: Muddy River

My family also shared the espresso chocolate torte which was delicious with strong coffee flavor and velvety chocolate mousse; wrapped around with chocolate ganache, another piece of chocolate lover’s dessert!

Muddy river was a chocolate mousse infused with Grand Marnier and some other liquor and it was strong!

They did not skim out on the alcohol at all!

The mousse sat on top of chocolate cake, and again wrapped in the chocolate ganache.

Both the espresso chocolate torte and Muddy River was on the sweet side and paired really well with plain coffee or espresso.

At home, I prefer to use bar soaps since the ingredients in making bar soaps are generally cleaner and often times better.

I used to have dry skin feeling all the time regardless of how much lotion I used.

Until one day, my friend told me that some ingredients in liquid soap and sometimes bar soap too, would strip moisture away from our body.

Chemicals such as propylene glycol would dehydrate our skin.

As a result, researching ingredients in the soap became important.

She recommended me to use these soaps that were made with natural ingredients, oil and essential oils, and the soaps would be moisturizing .

I then had the lucky opportunity to attend a soap making session with my friends.

All we used was good natural oils (shea butter, olive or coconut oil), essential oils and lye, which was sodium hydroxide or potassium hydroxide.

Lye was needed for saponification, the process of making soap, converting oil into soap.

Since I tried the good soap with simple and good ingredients, I had never turn back.

No more dry skin.

I bought my bar soaps from art fairs or farmers markets.

They were hand-made by folks and most of the times the ingredients were very clean (of course, always check!).

A piece of the good soap runs about $4 a piece, and on the surface it seems expensive.

However, with proper storage and usage (not letting water pound on the soap while showering, avoid having the soap sit in water, letting it dry out between uses), a piece of bar soap lasts a very long time.

I have ours simply sitting on an IKEA soap dish that has a slotted top tray which allows water to drain to the lower tray, and the dish sits away from the spraying area of the shower head.

After the conversion to bar soap, I realized I did not want to use bar soap in the kitchen because I found the thought of my raw meat/fish contaminated hands touching a bar of soap did not seem to be all that hygienic.

I was left to hunt for good healthy-ingredient liquid soap which proved to be harder than I thought, especially when price was factored in.

From my research, nearly all liquid forms of the products faired worse than its powder or solid counterparts, whether it was laundry detergent, hand soap or dish soap.

At first I used Method’s hand wash, and found that they had ingredients that was potentially cancer or allergy causing; Method also used fragrance except the fragrance-free option (fragrance free option EWG rating 3, scented ones ranging from 4-5).

Then, I switched to using Ballard Organics’ (unfortunately out of business now, they made really clean ingredients products) all-purpose concentrated liquid soap.

It was a very powerful soap. They claimed that it could be used to wash hands (diluted), dishes and etc.

What I found was that it was so powerful that it was drying my hands as well.

I finally landed with EO hand soap, lemon and eucalyptus.

The product was scented with natural essential oils.

It was not perfect, and had a rating of 3 from EWG, but price point was good especially buying large quantity online.

The soap did not dry my skin even after frequent hand washing from cooking and cut through cooking grease really well.

However, I just looked online and it appeared that the company had reformulated for the worse (when I bought it, it had a rating of 3, the new formulation had a rating of 4, which put them just on par with Method).

Seventh Generation was a good choice (EWG rating around 2) but it was also quite a bit more expensive.

Unfortunately, I would have to do research again when I used up this big jug of old formulation EO hand soap.

Meanwhile, I would love to share my recent love of Joseph Joseph soap dispenser called C-Pump.

My soap pump from the glass soap dispenser broke, and I was on the market for a new one.

I bought soap pump tops online to replace, but I was sent with some sub-par products which broke within 4 months.

I was hesitant to spend more money to get short-lived pumps.

So much about consuming less.

Came across this at Fred Meyer.

It looked like such a great idea!

Particularly from a hygienic point of view, I did not even need to press the soap pump with my meat/fish contaminated hand!

I was hesitant to use it right away without more research, perhaps too good to be true?

The verdict was split at Amazon.

Some people loved it and some people had problem with the soap dispenser staying put while pumping; some users also claimed that they could not dispense soap or that it was messy.

Well, I love this!

It worked really well with the consistency of the EO hand soap.

I had no pumping or messy concerns.

There was a rubber ring at the bottom of the bottle, and it was staying put for me on my kitchen sink counter.

I had a smile on my face every time I used this soap pump.

I had it for about a month now and hope it was built well and would last for a long time!

It was very smooth with strong dark chocolate; the tart was made with walnut, which was something that I normally did not care for, but this walnut was nutty, sweet and not bitter, I absolutely enjoyed it!

There was a goat’s milk whipped cream with the tart and it was tasty and not gamey at all.

My second favorite was the apple crumble– sweet apple, tasty with a buttery oat meal streusel, it was addictive!

The crème brulee had lovely maple flavor. and on the cremier side.

Surprisingly I liked the pot de crème least because it was more cream than chocolate to me.

They had 4 ways to make mussels on the menu.

None of us were mussels fan so we did not have any.

However, I had the full intention to bring my mother there when she visits as she likes mussels.

Another menu item we were very keen on experiencing was a whole roasted foie gras.

It said it was based on availability and it would feed 8-12 people.

We were gathering interest amongst our friends and perhaps we would pull it off!

We ate there before only on special occasions as it was fairly expensive.

Food was always fantastic and we never had a disappointment.

Harvest Vine was a Basque restaurant.

Basque country was on my list of countries to visit; we made it to Spain but did not go to Basque.

Short of going to Basque country to eat, Basque restaurant in Seattle will suffice for now.

We had a lovely anchovies with olive that night.

The anchovies were big, fatty, tender and delicious.

Generally I prefer the green olive, but the black olive paste at the bottom was equally tasty; paired with the super spicy pickled peppers and hard boil egg, we dip the last bit of sauce with our bread.

The anchovies were followed by beet salad, super thinly sliced, and dressed simply with olive oil, salt, pepper and chive – fresh and sweet!

The warm spinach side was interesting.

It was poached with figs and sherry.

It was less alcoholy then I thought.

I never had figs and cooked spinach combination, and they worked remarkably well together!

For bigger plates, we had the stuffed pepper with salt cod.

The cod paste was smooth, creamy, stuffed in a piquillos peppers with Basque famous viscaina sauce (tomatoes and pepperes were the sauce’s main ingredients).

This particular viscaina sauce seemed to have a high smoked component in it; I wonder if the peppers were roasted first?

Next up was the squid braised in squid ink.

The body of the squid was stuffed with the rest of the squid’s edible parts and braised.

Every bite was exploding flavors of fresh squid.

The rice provided served as an excellent vehicle to mop up all the squid ink and it was oh-so-good!

We finished our meal with Foie gras with arrop and apple sauce.

Arrop was a Spanish concentrated grape juice.

Foie gras had crispy skin and tasted superb with the sweetness of the arrop and tartness from the apple sauce.

It was excellent all around.

Throughout the meal, I had a delicious 2008 Garnacha (or Grenache) to accompany the delicious food.

We ended our meal with a flourless chocolate cake.

While the chocolate ganache was fantastic and the flavor of the cake was excellent, the texture was surprisingly dry.

My Shanghainese grandma made fried rice cakes often when she was still around.

It was one of my favorite Shanghainese dishes.

I was fortunate to learn the cooking know-how on this before she passed.

Contrary to Cantonese style rice cakes which were staples around Chinese New Year, Shanghainese rice cakes were to be eaten all year round.

In my grandma’s recipe, there were only 4 simple ingredients – clean and delicious.

Personally, nothing beat making this dish at home — particularly, we put less oil and large amount of vegetables in it.

When we eat out, the preparation was often only with sprinkles of vegetables and relatively greasy.

It would require some trail and error in the beginning to attempt this dish, specially in learning the strength of the cooktop; nonetheless, the reward is priceless!
INGREDIENTS

for 4 big servings

3 pieces of chicken thighs, shredded (pork can also be used)

2 long napa cabbage (the short fatter one can be the substitute as well, but the long ones are sweeter), sliced across leaves, half an inch wide

1 bag rice cake (I prefer the sliced kind)

1 finger segment worth of ginger, julienned
MARINATE FOR CHICKEN

marinate chicken for at least 15 minutes before cooking

1 tsp cornstarch

1/2 tsp of sesame oil

1/2 tbsp. soy sauce

1/2 tsp wine
OTHER CONDIMENT TO COLLECT BEFORE COOKING

2 tbsp. oil

1/2 tbsp. cooking wine

1/2 tsp. vegeta or chicken powder

1 tsp. of light soy sauce
DIRECTIONS

Add 1 tbsp. of oil in a big wok

Once smoky, add chicken and quickly stir-fry until the outside is cooked but the inside is still raw

Remove chicken from wok, and heat the remaining 1 tbsp. oil in a the wok

Once smoky, reduce heat to medium and add ginger

Cook ginger until just turn brown, increase to high heat

Immediately add napa cabbage and stir-fry

Then add wine and vegeta (or chicken powder) and stir-fry until the cabbage is half-cooked

Spread out the cabbage and spread out the sliced rice cake on top of the vegetables

Cover for 3 minutes and spread the chicken including juice on top of the rice cake

Cover again and wait for 5 minutes*.

Remove lid and use a chopstick to poke through rice cake to check for doneness. It should be easy to poke through.

Add 1 tsp. of soy sauce on top evenly and start stir-frying.

Once rice cakes, vegetables and meats are mixed well, it is ready!

*With my cooktop, it only takes 5 minutes. If the cooktop is weaker, it will take a lot longer. Key is to open the lid and poke the rice cake to check for doneness– but do so quickly as to save as much steam as possible for cooking in the system.

*If it starts smelling burnt, likely that napa cabbage at the bottom of the wok is burnt. Lift as much vegetables and rice cakes as possible with the spatula from the bottom of the wok to confirm, and add a little water (1/2 tbsp. to 1 tbsp.) while lifting the food.